


Strangers in a Strange Land

by sailaway



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Cultural Differences, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Huddling For Warmth, Loss of Virginity, Sexual Tension, Touch-Starved, Virgin!Mando
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-18 13:21:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21661462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sailaway/pseuds/sailaway
Summary: The physical contact may be necessary for survival, but she was dancing on the line between efficiency and intimacy. Like a too-full fuel tank it was about to spill over and ignite; the craving, the desire for more. For everything. For all that he was.
Relationships: The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/Original Character, The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 183
Kudos: 1217





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I may be too old to write an OC “huddling together for warmth” fic, but I'm also too old to give a fuck! If you're looking for more of a classic porn-without-plot, check out my Mando/Reader fic. Pick your poison depending on what you're in the mood for. This will be a two chapter story.
> 
> As always, I'm @kehrite on tumblr. Come chat if you're so inclined! I also have a Mando thirst server and I'll happily share an invite to those interested.

* * *

From an open floor compartment in the Razor Crest's cargo hold a mass of auburn hair materialized, followed by round eyes peeping up at the freshly frozen gangster. At least, he looked like she thought a gangster might. Sharply dressed, paralyzed face still contorted in a patronizing sneer. A well-connected underworld thug. Or not. The Mandalorian hardly filled her in on the details of his contracts.

Harper was vaguely aware of the carbonite sealing process but as she'd only joined the crew – or, more accurately, become it, it was just him and her – three days prior, she had yet to see it happen. She'd been working on a magnetic compensator beneath the floor when her new employer had come up the ramp, his scowling quarry in binders ahead of him, and without further ado fit the man into a frame and initiated the sealing. It was so abrupt, the steam and the hiss and the transition from cantankerous flesh to lifeless metal, she was afraid she'd let out an audible squeak.

The Mandalorian just looked down at her, weight to one side and head cocked, as if he'd taken her sound as preamble to a further remark. She couldn't tell if he disapproved of her squeamish reaction. Through the open hatch the elegant curve of his helmet glinted dully in the triple suns' afternoon light.

Mandalorians had reputations: they were tough, faceless, ruthless. Warriors. But this one, while all of those things and clearly no one to fuck with, had caught her off guard with his quiet good manners, startled her by his lack of ego, even elicited a smile or two with his occasional dry observations. She'd helped him when there was no one else to do so, and in return he'd extended an offer of employment. If he'd been solely what the rumors said, she wouldn't have accepted. Of course, the generous compensation helped.

Just then the light hit his helmet at the precise angle to reflect into her eyes, and she flinched, squinting up at him in an undignified manner. She rolled her hydrospanner between her fingers, flicked away hair that had escaped her headband and stuck to her oil-smudged cheek, then shrugged placatingly.

“Someone's gotta do your job.”

* * *

In between the crew bunk and the pilot's private room near the cockpit was the main 'fresher, a minuscule galley, and an equally tiny lounge-slash-dining area that had primarily been converted into workspace and storage. The couch was as of yet still usable and it was at this Harper sat, cross-legged, with a bowl of rehydrated stew, while across from her the Mandalorian disassembled something deadly-looking at the booth-style table. She knew speeders, spacecraft, things that went; not things that killed.

She'd been aboard almost two weeks. She was dying to know. It was the perfect moment.

“So, do you,” she began, before she lost her nerve, “Do you ever take it off?” She gestured with a wiggling finger toward his helmet. Duh, she chided herself. As if he wouldn't know what she was talking about.

“Yes,” he said, concise but not cold.

“What for?”

“Practicalities.” His attention remained on his screwdriver. “Eating, sleeping, maintaining it.”

Somehow she'd never seen him do any of those things. It was impressive. He just materialized each morning, looking as he did. She wondered how much he'd had to alter his habits and routine with the addition of a crew-member.

“Never in front of anyone?”

“No.” Despite the monosyllabic response, he didn't sound offended.

Harper poked at a squashy vegetable, spoon clicking on the bowl's rim. “Is it okay if I ask why?”

She had to really look at him to determine he was exasperated, or just considering his reply. It was his shoulders, she realized, that so often gave away his thoughts. Helmet angle also played a key factor, the subtleties of his body language creating a barometer of his moods.

“It's a symbol of my people,” he stated at last. His voice hadn't altered in volume, but it was crystalline in its self-assurance and unshakable pride. “Of dedication, and unity. Honor. Thus we transcend personal identity. This is the way.”

Perhaps he'd have given her more answers, had she more questions, and gods knew she was tempted to unspool her curiosities for him; he intrigued her, this Mandalorian, so intimidating and austere in appearance yet so familiarly and individually human under there. But that would skirt too close to prying, she felt. So all she said was, smiling around a mouthful of stew, “Just making sure you won't think I'm rude from now on, when I don't offer to heat you up some of whatever I'm eating.”

“I'll try to remember that.”

* * *

There was a new block in the carbonite rack, the collected bounties like pages in an old-fashioned paper book. Clearly Mando finished his task sooner than expected; Harper had left for the market first thing this morning, and it was only just now midday. The target must've surrendered without a fuss.

Her net sack bulged with fruits and vegetables – dehydrated meals were fine and well, but nothing could replace fresh produce – and a new display screen for one of the secondary navicomputers. Mando preferred to install cockpit parts himself, liking everything just so, so she left it there for him and went to the galley with the food.

He was at the table; it had been cleared of its usual spare parts and bottles of cleaning fluid. There was an open medkit, and sani-gauze, the white of it blotchy and vivid with blood. She dropped her sack on the couch, a violet-striped jogan fruit bouncing out and rolling to a stop against a cargo crate.

“What happened?”

“A troublesome Klatooinian.” There was a tightness to the words, as if his jaw was clenched in pain. So much for surrendering without a fuss.

Harper reined in the reflex to hurry over. He might not take kindly to being babied. She forced herself to put everything away in the conservator before sliding into the booth across from him.

“Can I help?”

“No.” He audibly grimaced. “Maybe.”

Next to the medkit was his blood-encrusted glove, the leather torn open. It was then that it occurred to her that his hand was bare. She'd never seen his skin before. She'd assumed he was human, but there was no way to know for sure... but the hand was a human shape, and a human shade. Sturdy, medium in tone.

The cauterizer tool was clearly an old friend to him but the wounds were long and deep enough to make her wince. Not to mention the damaged hand was his right; he was right-handed, and so attempting to do the job with his left.

“Hands are important,” she persuaded. “Let me do it?”

Mando slid the cauterizer across the table, and like a flower unfurled his battered hand toward her.

Gashes wrapped around it like crimson ribbons, one in his palm and another across his knuckles. The connection of their hands felt taboo; even the violent reveal of subcutaneous tissue was like a forbidden glimpse into the reality of him, the man, rather than the anonymous hunter. As she slid one hand beneath his, gently tipping it toward the light, a spark of something flickered in her gut.

Oh, it wasn't “something.” She damn well knew what.

Instead she chose to focus on the ragged edges of the wounds – “double-bladed serrated vibroblade,” he commented absently at one point – instead of his warm broad hand and the increasingly relaxed set of his shoulders and the quiet being in each other's presence. Flesh was a far cry from wiring and metal and duraplast but she liked this sort of work, mending things on a micro level, comfortable in her task and her own headspace. It was something to concentrate on, rather the electric thread of tension she was one hundred percent sure only she was feeling.

He was sitting very, very still. As if her touch were gossamer and at the least wrong move it would dissipate. Ninety-nine percent sure.

Earlier she'd tied a scarf to keep her hair out of her face and as she bent her head the tail of the colorful fabric came loose, swinging forward into her eyes; he caught it with his free hand, putting it gingerly on top of her head.

“Thanks.” This close, the breath from her word made his fingers twitch imperceptibly. There was an older scar on his thumb. Silvery and faint, just on the pad of it. No callouses. Must be the gloves.

Stupid. Ogling like she'd never seen a man's hand before.

But it was _his_ hand.

“Thank you,” he said calmly when she'd finished. “I appreciate the help.”

“Any time,” she said weakly, tidying away the medkit as he slid open the wall compartment for the garbage chute and tossed the bloody sani-gauze down. “Hope you have another glove.”

He rose, and flexed his fingers, just a little. “Several.”

* * *

The prostitute was either very bold, or very desperate, to solicit a Mandalorian. Or maybe just ignorant. All of the above. Who knew. Regardless, Harper compressed her smile as the coral-pink Twi'lek across the street from the spacecraft parts shop ran a painted nail along her lekku, pouting invitingly at Mando.

“I take it you're not interested in sampling the wares,” Harper prompted, sliding a teasing glance his way.

The silent incline of his helmet seemed unamused. “How do you know she's selling?”

“Who would risk making a pass at a strange Mandalorian without the chance of getting something out of it?”

“That's fair.”

She'd been told this was the only place within a day's journey that might have the part they needed. Usually Mando didn't accompany her on such errands, but he'd located his bounty and stashed him safely away in the hold just as Harper was going out.

“I think I'll go into town with you.” He'd said it levelly, like a statement, but something in his bearing made her think it was really a question.

“Intimidating guy like you?” she'd joked. Shore birds wheeled overhead as they fell into step beside each other on the causeway leading from the island landing pad to the harbor. “I'll get the best deals of my life.”

The shop's beat-up front counter opened straight onto the street and at last the frazzle-haired mechanic swung back into view behind it, milky blind eyes crinkling jubilantly as he held the V-line actuator aloft.

“Gods, thank you,” said Harper. “You're saving my life.”

“Bet it's the only one on the planet,” he grinned, his triumph turning flirtatious. “How 'bout this, my beauty, lemme take ya to the Quenk jazz bar at the plaza and I'll cut the price down t' half.”

Harper laughed. “We both know you have no idea if I'm a beauty or not.”

“Ya sound like it,” he declared, “And that's good enough for me!”

She reached into her hip pouch. “I love a bargain as much as the next person but I'll pay full.”

“Ya sure?”

“Yeah, you know, jazz isn't really my thing,” she demurred, “And we've gotta get out of here anyway.”

“We?” He made a show of exaggerated dismay. “Don't tell me you got a husband on that ship of yers!”

Harper shot Mando a silent look of mirthful disbelief. “Not quite,” she assured the mechanic, stifling her giggle.

His grin widened. “'Not quite' sounds promising.”

“Sorry to disappoint.” They'd already agreed on two hundred credits and she slid the chips across the scarred counter, reaching for the actuator.

Quick as a serpent the mechanic's grubby hand darted out, snatching her wrist. “Aw, no need to rush, my sweet – ”

Harper startled, yanking back, but he clutched tighter; there was motion in her peripheral vision.

“Seems all she's interested in is the part.” Mando's tone was more cutting than she'd heard from him in a while. “If you're going to sell it to her, do so. We have places to be.”

At the hard, modulated interruption the mechanic released her, cloudy eyes flicking sightlessly – Mando had not spoken until now – and he let out a high, nervous titter that got away from him at the end. “Oh, naturally, naturally! Just a bit of fun, I, uh... two hundreds credits is an excellent price but, for you, let's see, one-twenty-five?”

“Mm-hm.” Harper retrieved the additional credits and stowed both them and the actuator in her satchel while the mechanic, muttering to himself, retreated into the protection of his shop.

“Too bad,” she offered a few minutes later, once they'd crossed the causeway again. “We both could've gotten lucky tonight.”

Mando's deep sigh indicated exactly how he felt about that.

* * *

Two days later, parked on a mesa on a microscopic desert planetoid, Harper was finishing sealing up a minor fissure on the hull when Mando emerged from the ship's front hatch. She switched off her welding torch as he approached, pushing her goggles up onto her head.

“Heading out?” she queried. The wind freed strands of hair from her rather slovenly bun. “The Togruta, right? This place is a dustball, nowhere to hide. You'll find him soon.”

“Take this,” he said, and handed a blaster to her butt-first.

She blinked at it, returning the torch to her tool belt. She missed the loop a few times. “What for?”

“This is an R-20 scatterblaster. You can keep it, once I know you can use it.”

“Why?” In her youth she'd fired her mother's old blaster at the rodents that infested the family's scrap yards, but it was a clunky weapon, and she'd never accomplished much aside from scaring the critters off temporarily. This one was lightweight and compact, and fit better in her hand. “I told you when you hired me, I'm no good in a fight.”

“We stop by some seedy places. It's only smart to have a way to defend yourself if necessary. When you're done with the welding – ”

“I already am.” She patted the fresh seam in the hull. He nodded and when he turned, she followed, careful to keep her finger off the trigger as she stuffed her work gloves in her back pocket.

“This doesn't discharge a bolt like most blasters do,” he explained as they walked out into the desert. Scrubby vegetation twisted out of cracks in the sunbaked earth, spindly and dry but still tipped with dainty yellow blossoms. “It fires a spray of much smaller ones, which makes it effective protection for someone untrained with weaponry. I want you to at least get a feel for it, so the first time you need it isn't the first time you've ever used it.”

A hundred or so paces away was a small tumbleweed caught on a rock, bobbing in the wind as if it were on water. “There isn't much out here,” Mando said, pointing at it, “But take a shot at that tumbleweed over there.”

Harper fit both hands around the blaster's grip and sighted down the slightly flared barrel, bracing her feet apart for stability. She had an illogical pang of self-consciousness at Mando's attention on her, but all he offered was a mild, “It won't give much of a kick, but be ready for it anyway.”

There wasn't anything else to do but _do_ it, so she centered the desiccated bush in her sights as best she could and squeezed the trigger. A spray of tiny red bolts exploded forth, the narrow cone of effect only just singeing the edge of her target. She lowered the blaster, staring disagreeably at the innocuous tumbleweed.

“It's been a while, in case you couldn't tell,” she said.

He seemed unperturbed. “I chose this for you because aim isn't quite as crucial. If it were a traditional blaster you wouldn't have hit it at all.”

Her stomach gave an odd flutter at the thought of him considering her and what she'd need, sifting through his near-infinite equipment with her in mind. Though, she admonished herself, she doubted he'd really put forth that much effort. He knew his inventory like the back of his hand.

“It's made to be fired one-handed, if you prefer,” he added.

She did prefer, she decided, once she'd squared up again and raised the blaster. Before she could take aim she felt the brush of armor against her back and a hand on her rear shoulder, adjusting her stance so her body was more in line with the barrel than perpendicular to it. He didn't draw away.

“This'll help.” He tapped her inner arm. “And don't lock your elbow. It's not heavy enough you need to do that.”

When she fired off this time she hit the tumbleweed just right of center, scattering a thousand fluffy seeds on the breeze.

“Good,” he concluded. “Practice a few times.”

She did, and when she turned, he was gone.

* * *

Harper had surely been poisoned. Or infected with a backworld parasite, even now gnawing away at her squashy and defenseless brain. Some malady that caused hyper-fixation and loss of common sense.

She lay belly-down in her bunk, curtain drawn closed. She'd fallen asleep riffling through the various sundries of the day's interactions with her employer and now, as her sun-simulator chrono awakened her for the day cycle, he was the first thing that swam into her sleepy head.

Mando. And that wasn't even his real name. She'd overheard the nickname in one of his guild holo messages and, well, she had to call him _something_.

She slipped on the frontal ladder yesterday – she'd had a stack of compressor fins in one hand and engine grease on her other – while he was waiting to come up and he'd caught her neatly around the waist, fins clattering to the floor as she'd collided into his armored chest, one arm flying around his neck. And it wasn't that he'd held onto her, but how he'd let her go: so fast, like she'd burned him. He'd stood there, stock-still and uncharacteristically useless, while she laughed out a sheepish apology and knelt to gather the fins.

“Excuse me,” he'd intoned rather formally, and vanished up the ladder as if she'd lit a fire under it.

Then the day before when she'd stretched, just a simple morning stretch and a yawn, and from across the hold his helmet ticked toward her at that discreet angle that indicated lingering eyes. She'd been wearing a tanktop so worn out it was near transparent. But maybe her yawn had just looked stupid.

But then there was the way he'd apparently lost any sense of personal space and regularly stood a mere hand's breadth away to speak to her. Or do anything. Not long ago she'd returned from a supply run to find him standing in front of the ladder like a bouncer guarding an exclusive nightclub.

"You left the scatterblaster," he'd informed her by way of greeting.

"Oh, yeah," she'd agreed absent-mindedly, switching her sack of root vegetables to her other hip. They'd keep for a long time if she stored them somewhere cool. "I was just going out for a couple things and I forgot - "

"I want you to carry it. That's why I gave it to you." 

"I know," she assured him. "But that's a speck of nothing village, no offense to them, so I don't think anything was going to happen."

"There's no way to predict that." Mando's level voice had intensified a shade as he stepped forward, lowering his head as if for emphasis. "It's important. Protection is important."

His cuirass made contact with her shirt a heartbeat before her back hit the opposite wall. Her inhale was an unnatural stuttering, as if her lungs were distracted from their sole purpose.

"I know," she repeated. This close, she had to tilt her head back to look into his visor. Sometimes she imagined that if she just gazed hard enough at that black T, somehow his mysteries would unfold for her. "I promise I'll keep it with me from now on. I'll even buy a holster for it. Okay?" 

His stance remained tight and unmoving before, apparently mollified, he stepped aside. "Okay." 

Well, she argued with herself now, space on a ship was tight. Everything was cramped. Maybe she simply wasn't half as good at reading him as she thought she was. Embarrassing.

There came three knocks on the wall outside her bunk.

“Yeah?” she blurted, pushing up on her arms with instinctive alarm he'd pull the curtain back. But of course he wouldn't. If anyone knew about privacy, it was him.

“There's a pack of locals wanting to trade. They've got a hovercart full of parts. Told them we weren't interested but I thought I'd give you the chance before they leave.”

“Alright, great, for sure.” She tugged her too-big sweater back around her shoulders to offer some semblance of decency. As if the woven material could protect her. “I'm up.”

* * *

“Buy anything?” Mando asked as he initiated take-off later in the afternoon. He left the cockpit door open more than he used to. Harper slid it shut and braced her palm on the doorframe as the ship gave the little lurch of initial ascension.

“Nah. Nothing but junk.” Rising out of the bleak forest, the landscape gave way to vast, lifeless black-rock lava fields that rolled out below them as they accelerated toward the stony atmosphere. The light rain that had been pattering all day was increasing. Might even be turning to snow.

“You say it just like that to them?”

“You know perfectly well I was nice about it – ”

There was an unnatural jolt and the shriek of metal and a terrible roaring and the Razor Crest heaved, then slowed strangely, as if captured by an invisible hand. Harper's stomach pitched with a sudden loss of altitude.

“What's going on back there!?” Mando called as she slammed the door activation panel and ducked down into the ladderwell.

The roaring was wind. She stared, clinging onto the ladder rungs: the back half of the ship's hull was missing, simply gone, a gaping hole opening up onto whipping clouds and the landscape far below. The ruined floor was slick with hydraulic fluid, the hole's jagged edges spitting and sparking.

Obviously not waiting for a reply - the situation was hard to miss - Mando hauled at her shirt collar, and she scrambled back up. In the cockpit behind him a furor of alarms flashed and wailed their warnings.

“I can't land this safely,” he yelled, to be heard over the howling wind. He jerked his chin down the ladder. “Not with it like that.” Or at least she thought that's what he said. She'd come to the same conclusion. Maybe if the damage was lesser, or somewhere else on the ship, but already it was starting to dip and yaw, thrown off balance.

“Bail out?” she yelled back.

He nodded.

“Go, go,” he urged from behind as she ran the length of the upper level, shimmying down the rear ladder and hurtling into the cramped escape pod. With how close it was to the brand spankin' new hole in the hull, they were lucky it hadn't been lost, too. As she yanked down one of two jumpseats on the wall it was her turn to chant “C'mon, c'mon, where are you” as she threaded herself into the harness – then he was there, ducking in and initiating launch before sliding onto the other jumpseat

Harper's stomach dropped as the pod burst away from the ship, plummeting back down to the planet's surface like a meteor. They shouldn't be spinning out of control like this – light flickered through the narrow window slit, disorienting; she couldn't catch her breath, brain jostling in her skull.

Across from her Mando was _still_ strapping into the harness, what was he doing – he struggled to secure the last buckle, part of it was caught on his hip armor and wouldn't click together...

The window showed rocky black, and she squeezed her eyes shut and braced for collision.

* * *

“We're going to die,” Harper commented matter-of-factly.

Mando was silent. A common state of being for him, but in this case, no doubt a result of his unconsciousness.

Like a wild creature the wind screamed at the cave's entrance, a small and jagged hole through which the last of the day's sunlight struggled to reach. Rain pounded the low cliff-face but the depths of the narrow cave granted some refuge.

By design the escape pod was a robust contraption, but without the stabilizers – she'd decided they must have undergone damage when the ship was ripped apart – it was essentially a falling hunk of metal. By the time it tumbled to a stop on the lava beds a brutal gash had been torn up its gullet and the life support systems had given up the ghost. For a gut-wrenching moment, she'd thought Mando had, too.

With freezing hands Harper clicked on a fire in the little tin burner, coaxing forth flames meager in both warmth and light. In addition to the burner she'd gathered a medkit, a tightly packaged synth-heat blanket, and several nutri-packs from the pod, but there were no other currently useful amenities. She unwrapped the blanket; it was large, the fabric threaded with fine, flexible wiring that activated and heated once the pack was open. She swaddled it around herself and zipped it up, staring anxiously at Mando's motionless form.

She wasn't a weak woman, but neither did her skills lie in brute strength – and he was heavy. Really heavy. It had taken her fifteen minutes of laboriously dragging him through the downpour to reach the bluffs. Halfway through she'd seriously considered stripping him of his armor to lighten the load, but concluded that dragging him unprotected across across rough lava would only add to the damage he'd already received in the landing.

An involuntary shiver seized her. Her loose trousers and long-sleeved tunic were comfortable enough for the cool recycled air of his ship, but wet clothes spelled disaster and beneath the folds of the blanket she stripped, wringing out the sopping fabric and laying it flat in the hopes it might be merely damp by tomorrow. Bare now except for her underthings she burrowed into the blanket, teeth still chattering violently.

She wasn't sure what to do about Mando.

Beneath his armor were three padded layers on his torso alone, maybe more she wasn't aware of. All soaked with icy rain. And the sun was almost down. The temperatures would go with it.

The ceiling was too low to fully stand so she scooted over to him. Nobody would appreciate being undressed unawares, but with him, there was that unique consideration to be made regarding his helmet. He'd never made specific mention about the armor, though. Was there a principle against removing that before others as well?

 _Kriff,_ it was cold.

Before she could overthink it she knelt before him, slipping her hands as little as possible out from the blanket and unfastening his cuirass from the chestplate beneath. Immediately she realized this was a task destined for failure. She couldn't get thick, soaked, form-fitting clothes off a deadweight man – and she certainly couldn't pull it over a helmeted head.

The contours of it shone gold in the feeble flames. That thing was near-indestructible... but only near. Only half strapped into the pod as he'd been, he must have conked his head well and good in the landing. Of course, better conked than splattered. She'd considered jabbing him with the medkit's stim injection, but decided it was better he rest until his brain was ready to wake up naturally. Hells if she knew. She wasn't much of a medic.

Now she was rethinking that. She could just wake him up and... ask him.

She retrieved the injection, reaching for his limp hand and pulling back his glove to expose his wrist. It was the quickest access point she could think of. The needle was fat and she muttered an apology as she jabbed it in, winced in commiseration as she depressed the plunger, then sat back on her heels as Mando came to life.

Through his helmet came the static of a cough, followed by a long groan and a sudden jerk upright. He seemed to regret the reflexive motion as soon as he did it, groaning again and bowing his head, but still his posture remained tense with the alarm of a sudden awakening in strange and foreboding surroundings.

“Hi,” Harper said breathlessly.

He didn't respond straight away; taking in the cave, no doubt piecing his memories together. “Hi.”

“You're probably freezing. Me too. I took off all my wet things, but – you're still soaking, and I can't leave you like that, but I can't get your clothes off – ”

“You tried to take my clothes off?”

“Kind of, I'm sorry, but I didn't get very far because...” She mimed knocking on her own head.

“Give me a moment.” He took stock of his equipment – slowly, as if movement pained him – then flicked through an info read-out on his gauntlet's control panel. “Is there another of those?"

“Another of – oh, you mean the blanket. No.” She cleared her throat. “It's... it's really large, though.”

He angled his head her way, and he didn't have to speak for her to know he fully grasped her meaning. Given the cold, the flush that came to her cheeks was, for once, welcome.

“It's only practical,” she said defensively.

“It is practical,” he agreed. But still he made no movements to undress, or draw closer. At a loss, she brought her knees up to her chest once more beneath the swathed blanket, leaning back against the wall of the cave. If he wanted to be stoic, that was up to him.

Shadows danced in the burner's weak flame. Each time she thought she might have reached a semblance of comfort she'd be startled by a gust of wind, or racked by another full-body shudder, but the synth-heat was helping. Meanwhile she could already see Mando's tightening posture, the instinctive closing-in on oneself that was the natural response to cold. The gloves' saturated leather would be shrinking on his hands, the wet canvas and padding of his flak vests and trousers sticking to his skin, chilling skin and muscles and tendons down to the bones.

She leaned forward and switched off the burner.

“What did you do that for?” came Mando's voice in the darkness.

“You know I've never questioned your beliefs.” Even if deep down she wanted to see him. Touch him. Watch his mouth form her name. “But I know you take your helmet off for necessary purposes.”

“Generally.”

“I'd say this counts.” The wind sent a fresh skittering of raindrops across the floor at the cave's entrance. “Let's not die on this backwater rock, okay?”

She heard nothing from him in the dark; and yet she _heard_ him, thinking. Her own thoughts spiraled round and round alongside his. Was it still forbidden to remove it if she couldn't see him? Was it permissible to touch, if he couldn't be seen? Was the level of intimacy the same? This wasn't an engine or turbine or a hyperdrive, to fix or to solve. She could tangle it out in her mind all night and never come to an answer. The only one who could was a Mandalorian, and one was sitting in front of her, as silent as the tomb.

His boots scuffed on the ground. “I'm going to take my armor off now.”

Harper hid her gulp behind another chatter of teeth. She recognized what a momentous exercise in trust this was for him, how conflicted he must feel, even if it was important and even though she couldn't actually see him. Somehow, she didn't think Mandalorians were quick to find loopholes or make excuses.

Adrenaline sped her heart at the sounds of his armor latches, wet fabric rasping against more wet fabric, layer after layer being stripped away and broadcasting vibrant images to her mind: his bare skin, his natural unarmored silhouette, the lines of his body revealed.

“Where are you?” she whispered, once the sounds stopped.

“Right here.” His natural voice was completely recognizable, but lighter; not higher in pitch, or lower in volume, but just _lighter,_ clearer, without having first been artificially filtered through the helmet's vocoder.

Uncertainly she reached out, seeking without sight. If she squinted she could make out hazy shapes and lines but could make no sense of what was what. Then her outstretched hand brushed loose cloth and cool skin and she snatched it back.

“No point in that,” he remarked.

“Sorry. You're right. Sorry.” She swallowed. “How do you want to – ”

“Give me one edge of the blanket and I'll – ”

“The ground's flatter over here – ”

Through a jumble of awkward adjustments Harper spread out the blanket and laid down, wrapping herself in one half and leaving the other for him. As she zipped it up again her elbow brushed what must be his hair; it wasn't close-cropped to his head because it moved, quite a bit. This new knowledge sizzled through her like a few thousand volts. As he settled she lay board-stiff, body naturally wanting to curl in on itself to preserve heat – and on him, for an additional source of it – but her brain, suddenly shy about the proximity and and very conscious of her near-nudity, prevented her from doing so. She suspected he might feel similarly.

“I'm sorry about the ship,” she ventured.

“It's just a ship. I'm not sentimentally attached to it. We can get another one.”

 _We._ “I'm thinking mostly about your weapons, the equipment – ”

“My weapons locker will have withstood the crash. At daylight we'll track the ship and salvage what we can.”

“I was thinking about that. While you were... out.” Remembering the locals and their truly pitiful selection, recalling the round hole in the ship's bottom... rounder than seemed plausible for some kind of malfunction. “I'll bet anything we were set up. They didn't really want to trade, what they wanted was to get close enough to slap an explosive on the hull. Just enough to bring us down.”

A low, tight exhale revealed Mando's anger. They'd be picking apart the ship right now like vultures on carrion.

Harper shifted, a shiver racking her from top to toe, and knotted her hands together against herself. She'd grown up on a temperate moon, dominated by woodland and warm savannah where it wasn't scrapyard. The cold made her feel like she was malfunctioning. Especially given that her waterproof parka, her first purchase after her first wages, was far away on the Razor Crest.

Mando's voice was a soft tickle at her temple. “For this to be effective, we're... going to have to get a lot closer.”

Harper jumped at his hand on the small of her back; the fingers spread out, pulling her in. Only her arms, caught between their bodies, prevented her from being drawn fully against him. She'd never been so close, except when she'd fallen from the ladder, but that lasted a second or two and they were both so flustered it barely counted.

Her hands were clenched, but as their shared body heat grew her fists began to loosen. He wore some kind of coarseweave shirt, barely damp at all. All his top layers must have protected it. Through the slit necklace, her inadvertent fingertip brushed his chest.

A deep, private part of herself had ignited with anticipation at the prospect of this unique circumstance, but instead of exciting, it was painfully disconcerting. Not seeing Mando's face was nothing new, but at least there was normally body language to go off of. Now she had nothing but his breathing and vague guesswork. He'd even pulled back the hand that had brought her close.

“Your hair is longer than I imagined,” she ventured, to break the discomfort. “Not that I... imagine you. That is to say,” she coughed, “Out of respect for your culture I've never asked what you look like, but it's hard not to be curious when you spend time with a person.”

He stayed soundless. So much for alleviating the awkwardness.

“Well,” he began after a heavy pause. “I'm a man.”

Though his tone was impassive, Harper could hear the hidden smile in it. Relief made her snort with inelegant laughter. “Mmm, yeah, I managed to deduce that.”

She was greeted with only silence. She couldn't think of anything else to add, so she burrowed further into the blanket. “Didn't mean to insult you.”

She knew exactly what she would do when they were back on the Razor Crest, assuming it was still functional. She'd put on her favorite nightshirt, and drink a stupidly big mug of steaming broth, and –

The rise in Mando's chest gave her a half-second's notice he was about to speak. “Brown hair.”

Her mental image of him shifted. “Brown hair?” she repeated.

“Brown hair,” he agreed, very calmly and unremarkably.

“Eyes?” she pressed, not wanting to scare him off or offend but also embarrassingly eager to take advantage of his openness.

“Dark.”

“So, brown as well?”

“Very brown.”

She cut herself off, but wanted more. The details didn't have to be specific, or identifying. That might defeat the purpose of the helmet. But the intimacy of it was intoxicating. She wanted to at least picture him as clearly as possible in her head. Again, probably defeating the purpose. She would've sworn she felt the ghost of his palm on her hip... doubtful. It was gone now, anyway.

Beneath his thin shirt his musculature was lean but substantial; athletic, but not at all lanky. The body of tough and dextrous man. Through the neckline was a light shadow of hair on his chest, but not much. But she shouldn't dwell on that. The physical contact may be necessary for survival, but she was dancing on the line between efficiency and intimacy. Like a too-full fuel tank it was all about to spill over and ignite; the craving, the desire for more. For everything.

 _Stop_ she begged her fingertips but they moved anyway up his neck, gliding over the apple of his throat, finding the gentle pulse beneath his jaw. It was dusted with facial hair – neither long enough to be called a beard, nor prickly the way fresh stubble was.

 _Don't do it_ said logic as she reached the soft spot where jawbone ticked up into ear. Her voice was unsteady, and this time, it wasn't from the cold. “Can I touch you?”

“You already are.”

Her fingers hovered, yearning to leap forward onto the uncharted planes of his features. “You know what I mean.”

“...yes.”

It was not a delicate face; sturdy and squarish, the bone structure rugged. His nose was strong and curved, as if it might have been broken at some point. Thick hair curled loosely around his ears. Brown, he'd said. Her heart pounded in time to the dozen potential faces flicking through her mind, her tactile exploration – in addition to the details he'd granted – honing the idle visuals of him she'd created in the past.

He remained motionless. His breathing seemed a little tight. Surely he'd stop her, if that's what he wanted... but still she retracted her hand. If things were awkward tomorrow, at least she could handily avoid eye contact. Small mercies.

Silence inside. Outside, the wind was mournful now, whipping past the entrance and onward across the desolate lava plain. Mando's chest rose and fell as soft and regular as if in sleep; but somehow she sensed he wasn't. She couldn't picture him drifting off so readily. Not with circumstances being what they were. The loss of the ship, the concussion, the cold... this.

“I think it's helping,” she remarked vaguely.

“I assume you mean the blanket.”

“Yes. Yes, of course. You feel warmer?”

He made a dismissive, resigned sound. Guess that was a no.

“Here, then.” Overwhelmed by impulse, but squashing it and pretending it was pragmatism, she slid her arms around his waist. He paused, and her gut sank as he pulled away; but no, he was only shifting to allow her to better put one arm under him.

Until now they'd been close, but now she fitted herself into the angles of his body like a puzzle piece until they lay completely flush against each other. Gods, he was solid. But she was frail and flawed and, unable to help herself, she pressed her cheek to his steadfast heartbeat.

If she was tentative, he had reason to be ten times as reserved. He was masked quite literally from the world, and his profession left him with limited opportunity for intimacy. At the beginning, she would've said there was no interest, either. Now she wasn't sure that was true. He wasn't a hard or unfeeling man; she'd learned that much. Just a careful one. Dutiful. Whose armor was not not only on the outside.

When was the last time he'd been touched? Not aggressively in combat, or a passing brush of shoulders, or an accidental run-in in the corridor, but with fondness and affection or at least something resembling trust?

“You can trust me,” Harper murmured. “And I know even though I say so, you're the only one who can decide that. But... I just wanted to tell you.”

Beneath the blanket, in the tolerable temperature now created by their bodies, his hand came to settle on her waist.

Her pulse jumped as she lay curled against the man she'd come to know, the man she'd been living so intimately with but who was still a stranger in so many ways. As far as straight facts, when it came down to it, she had few: human male, bounty hunter, Mandalorian. He'd been an orphan, and from something he'd said about the early years of the Empire she guessed his age at late thirties. She knew he didn't like humidity, or dense crowds, but he did like those frozen balawai meat pies – either that or he was throwing them out the window when she wasn't around. She knew the particular way his head tilted when he found something humorous. That he was more affected by sincere compliments than he'd care to let on. And she knew he deserved to be loved, if he wanted it.

Harper took his face in his hands once more and kissed him. His response was slow – not reluctant, but cautious. Her kiss was gentle in its passion, as if with it she could say all the things brimming inside her that she'd desperately tried to ignore. Her hands slid into his hair, over his scalp; she felt rather than heard a soft sound in his throat. It seemed beyond belief, dream-like, that she was actually touching him like this, and being touched in return. She wanted to kiss his neck, his chest, map the unknowns of his body with her fingertips. No, not a dream, nor the fevered imaginings of a hypothermic woman... his warmth, his spreading hands on her waist, kept her fully in the reality of this, here, now.

“Stop,” he breathed, pulling away.

“I'm sorry,” she said, almost simultaneously. Guilt and hideous humiliation swept through her. “That was wrong of me, I – ”

“No, that's not – you have to understand, Harper.” He'd drawn back, but he hadn't let her go. “When I say I don't remove my helmet in front of others, I... mean that very literally. I don't. Haven't.”

Oh. _Oh._ “Never?”

“Never.”

She understood what he was telling her. She took his hand between hers. It was the one she'd fixed up; it felt healed well enough. She couldn't tell. Didn't matter right now.

“I care about you very much,” she confessed. “More than I ever... I didn't plan to. But I do. Whatever you need, I'll accept. It's okay. I mean, aside from freezing to death because you want me to get away and go to the other side of the cave.”

A puff of air was the only sign of his amusement. Her heart constricted. She'd only heard that before through his helmet, as a wisp of static.

“I do not want that for either of us,” he confirmed. “I want... to be with you here, like this, until the morning.”

“Until the temperature rises,” she agreed.

“Not just because of the cold.” His hands slid further, to the small of her back. “Come back to me.”

Not for the first time, Harper fell asleep thinking of Mando. But this time it was different, because it was not just of him, but _with_ him; and the rocky ground and the storm beyond could hardly have mattered less as she slipped into a light but contented slumber.

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took me longer than expected to finish, I overhauled it a couple times! I've never watched the animated Star Wars shows so I don't know much about Mandalorian culture (thanks, Wookieepedia, for what I now know,) so I bullshitted a lot of it, forgive me. 
> 
> Also, while this is technically the finishing chapter, stay tuned for a third in the form of an epilogue I believe will be very relevant to your interests.

* * *

The Razor Crest lay on its side like a beached whale, haloed by broken branches and wet earth churned up from the impact. The interior had been thoroughly ransacked, most of the weapons taken along with other sundries; food, tools, heating tubes, the conservator and rehydrator. Also gone were several of the large external hull panels, in addition to the ones destroyed in the explosion. The vital organs – engines, hyperdrive, repulsors, where the real resale money was but also too bulky to be readily moved – were intact. With the exception of one pouch, the multiple stashes of credits around the ship had also been overlooked.

“These weren't scrappers,” Harper concluded. “This wasn't a professional operation. They mostly took living necessities and what they could fit on a couple hovercarts.”

“Along with everything in my armory that wasn't bolted down,” Mando gritted out.

Harper added up what else was missing: reactant intermixer, fuel cells, discharge filters, secondary thrusters, a hell of a lot of wiring –

Mando slammed his palm on the back of the pilot's seat and spit out a half-growl, interrupting her mental tally.

“It's in better condition than we expected,” she offered, as he sat down more aggressively than the seat deserved. “We've got options.”

The cockpit had been all-but-ignored, only confirming her suspicions that this was the the work of a band of forest recluses rather than a calculated assault. Nav systems and sensory arrays were valuable. Theirs was currently charting the nearby area, pinging on a population center a half day's travel away. If they wanted to get there before nightfall, they'd have to leave soon; it took them the entire morning to follow the transceiver link between between Mando's wrist control and the ship's computer.

He was never chatty, but as they'd trekked across the lava beds and on into sparse alpine forest, he'd been more reserved than was typical; withdrawn into himself, almost. Yet his silence was at odds with his demeanor: he walked closer to her, at times their arms grazing when their steps coincided. But then maybe that, like everything else, she was over-interpreting. It could well be that last night's intimacy was a one-off event, an isolated and unforeseen result of a concussion. Head injuries could alter behavior. Perhaps even his recollection of it was hazy. But she didn't know; they had yet to speak about it.

“We can hit the city,” Mando said now, tapping the pulsing dot on-screen, “Get what we need, and pay to have the parts brought out.”

“Those won't come cheap, not on a backwater like this," she put in, "But it can be done. Though that's just replacing what was taken... most time-consuming will be the repairs for the explosion. It's a big hole.”

Mando exhaled, long and slow and tight. “They might come back to finish the job.”

“The only alternative is to sell what's left and buy new,” Harper continued. She straightened, hands on her hips. “It's your call.”

He continued looking at the screen, as if it might unexpectedly provide him with new and useful information. “What would you do?”

“It's not my ship – ”

“That's not what I asked.”

She could see her own misty reflection in the back of his helmet – the pale blurry-featured oval of her face, big pile of hair tied up on her head. “All the guts are still here. It's a good ship. The only reason to call it a loss is if you're in a rush.” The thieves hadn't touched the three carbonite-sealed individuals in the hold – not much they could do with them – though usually there wasn't a hard time limit on bounty fulfillment.

Punctuating their thinking was voice from beyond the ship; calling out in a language Harper didn't recognize. Her eyes cut over to Mando. “Looks like you might be right about them coming back.”

But Mando had gone very, very still. His body seemed almost to vibrate with a tension that was overkill for some scavengers.

 _What is it?_ Harper mouthed. His head angled slowly, like a bird of prey, and he rose from the pilot's seat. She followed his line of sight, drawing closer to the cockpit window to see what held his attention on the ground below.

It was another Mandalorian.

She blinked, to be sure she was seeing correctly. Mandalorians weren't common, and hers was the only one she'd ever seen in person. (Hers. A slip of the mind. She'd think on that later.) This one's feet were planted firmly apart but at his sides, his gloved hands were turned forward to indicate they were empty.

She looked back to Mando for cues but he gave none. At last, unable to stand the strained silence, she asked, “Do you know who that is?”

“No.” He spun on his heel. “Stay here.”

Through the window Harper watched the two Mandalorians approach each other like strange cats sizing each other up. In Mando's shoulders was that particular intent she knew indicated he was a muscle-twitch away from drawing his blaster. From their body language and subtle gestures they appeared to be talking now, albeit tensely; her gaze raked over them both, dying to know what they were saying.

They talked for a long time. She grew impatient, drumming her fingers on the console, and took the opportunity to study the other Mandalorian. He was burlier in stature, and though his helmet was a bluish tint, his armor was so battered it was hard to tell what color the pieces had originally been, if not mismatched altogether like Mando's. And where Mando's demeanor indicated caution the other's was, if not totally relaxed, at least more at ease.

When Mando at last stepped away she exited the cockpit, sliding down the ladder to meet him at the open hatch. She didn't have to ask what happened, her curiosity was obvious, but she did anyway.

“So...?”

“He says his name is Yoran, of Clan Rill.” Mando repeated this carefully, as if it were information from a long-ago dream. Harper had learned tidbits from him regarding the existence of a clan system among Mandalorians. Events still murky to her regarding some kind of Imperial onslaught had widely fractured their population. Mando had never been completely candid about it, and whether that was because he chose to be vague or because it was still unclear to him as well, she couldn't be sure.

“You sound like you're not sure if you believe him,” she prompted.

He sighed, and crossed his arms. “I would've assumed the armor stolen, had he not greeted me as he did.”

“He spoke to you in Mandalorian?”

“Mando'a," he corrected quietly. "Yes.”

She looked past him to see the other Mandalorian, standing calmly just out of the treeline. When he saw her, he nodded, just once. “What does he want?”

“To help.”

“Forgive my paranoia, but what's in it for him?”

“Nothing,” Mando said simply. “It seems we passed by his dwelling on our way here and he saw me...” He paused here, as if searching for a translation for something, then abandoned the attempt. “He extended his assistance out of duty, not self-interest.”

“He lives here?”

“Says he has for a long time. Since the Purge. The area doesn't get much in the way of visitors, and the few people out here live rough. He thinks some of them just spotted our ship, and saw an opportunity. ”

She wanted to know what Mando really thought about this unexpected encounter. In the past she'd had loose conjectures there were other Mandalorians he kept in contact with, but he'd never volunteered that information, and she never pried. How common was it, to run into another? Mildly infrequent, or vanishingly rare? But now wasn't the time.

“You trust him?” she ventured.

He sighed again. “I'm choosing to. I don't think he has any reason to deceive me. If he wanted to strip the ship any further he could've done so already. And he has a speeder.”

“That helps.”

He nodded in slow acceptance. “It helps. Get that parka of yours, and whatever else you want to bring.”

She did, bundling up gratefully in the dense parka and stuffing a few necessities into a satchel. No doubt they'd have to stay in the city overnight.

Outside, the two Mandalorians stood by an older-model speeder bike she hadn't noticed before, tucked away in the trees. They turned their heads in unison as she came forward. She'd come to associate the distinctive helmet and visor so exclusively with Mando that it was disconcerting to see it on another.

Yoran said nothing, so she offered only a cursory and civil smile while Mando asked him, “Do you have far to return on foot?”

“I do not live far.” It was an older man's voice, dignified in enunciation and dry with age.

“My thanks for the speeder. We won't be in the city long.”

The speeder was designed for one rider, but the seat was long enough to fit two reasonably. It bobbed as Mando swung up onto it and Harper waited until he'd settled before climbing up behind him. There was nothing for her to grab onto except him, but given the impediment of the rifle slung over his back, she could only angle her arms around and take hold of his hips.

He tilted his head back. “Ready?”

She decided she simply would not think about anything beneath his vests. “Ready.”

* * *

They reached the city of Ostagat just before sundown. It spread loosely across a rocky plateau rising out of the boreal forest, steeply angled wooden roofs mingling with modern duracrete towers. It was no bustling metropolis, but it was reasonably sized, and should pose no problem in tracking down the long list of necessary parts.

Accommodations were readily found near the spaceport in the form of a squat building directly adjacent, with a basement-level tavern and rooms to rent above. Mando parked the bike in the side alley, next to an old-fashioned chimney from which a slim pillar of smoke twirled skyward.

“I'd swear on the maker I haven't eaten in years,” Harper groaned as she descended the narrow steps to the tavern, shaking back her snow-dusted hood and inhaling the rich scent of frying meat. “I doubt they'd care if you took a plate upstairs.”

From the top of the stairway Mando responded only with an ambiguous inclination of his helmet. “Go eat. I'll pay for lodging.”

The tables were all full so she slid in at the bar, clicking a couple credit chips on the counter once she caught the barkeep's eye. “Whatever's hot and ready.”

She wondered if Mando would come down. For obvious reasons he didn't eat in public, but that hadn't stopped him from joining her at cantinas and eateries from time to time. But as she was handed a steaming dish of gravy ladled over some kind of spiced grains she dove in, her fretting taking a back seat to the primal need for nourishment.

“Can I take a bowl for my – my friend?” she asked when she'd scraped hers clean.

The barkeep blinked, then shrugged. “Sure. Someone can bring it up, if you like. Which room?”

“Actually, I don't know. Let me get back to you.” Harper restrained herself from all but licking the bowl and went back upstairs.

“My traveling companion,” she queried the plump woman at the front desk, “He said he'd get us a room?”

“Mm,” she said without looking up from her ledger, “The two at the very end of the hallway.”

“Two...?”

“Yes, two.” The woman examined Harper over oblong spectacles as if she might be dim, and jabbed behind her with her thumb. “Last ones in the hallway, like I said. There are only eight rooms, you can't miss 'em. Your friend has the keycodes.”

Odd emotions swelled in Harper. Mando had gotten two rooms. Well – it only made sense, didn't it? He'd want a private space to undress, decompress, breathe. She'd just thought... well, she wasn't sure what. She'd spent the entire day trying _not_ to think, because if she allowed it, she might spiral into what felt dangerously close to a crisis. As he'd maneuvered the speeder through the sparse trees she'd stared at his caped back, as if through sheer brainpower she could burn a hole through the coarseweave and the beskar and find the heart of him. Perhaps foolishly, she'd dared to think she already had last night. Clearly that had been premature.

She rapped on the last door with two knuckles. No answer; must be the other one. She did a 180, and tried the door opposite. Within a few seconds it opened to reveal Mando standing there looking – well, looking the same as ever.

“Hey,” Harper said, wrestling the anxious urge to babble. “So, I just ate downstairs, and they said they'd bring a meal up for you.”

He inclined his head. “Thank you for thinking of me.”

For thinking of him. For _thinking of him_. Did he realize, have even the remotest clue, how much mental space of hers he occupied?

“Long day,” she said lamely.

He nodded solemnly. “Long day.”

“So... another Mandalorian, in the middle of nowhere on a middle of nowhere planet?" she tried. "Probably was weird for you.”

His helmet lowered a bit, as if gazing past her. “It was.”

She scraped the toe of her boot on the floor. “The food here is really good.”

“That's... good.”

Her face was getting hot. He was waiting for her to go. Well, she wasn't going to stand in front of him all night like an imbecile. But she also refused to toss and turn in a strange bed, puzzling this out until the wee hours of the morning.

“Look, I'm a believer in honesty,” she began, “And I gotta be honest with you, Mando. I... I'd like to talk about what happened in the cave. And I know you probably don't, but we should be on the same level.”

He said nothing. She compressed her lips to stop herself from rambling on.

At the end of the hallway a round window faced the perfunctory fence around the spaceport. Through the wire slats she could see a handful of ships, dimly lit by security lights, – mostly freighters, a trash hauler, a small personal yacht. She pretended to find the view more interesting than it was. Giving him time to think. From the corner of her eye she saw his rising hand, was he about to touch her, but she wouldn't look, wow that fence was riveting –

His leather fingertips ghosted over the hair at her temple. She turned her head back to him little by little, looking up into his visor, hands tingling at the tactile memory of what was behind it.

“I shouldn't have done that. Shouldn't have given in to what I...” He cut himself off, withdrawing his hand, and Harper had to fight with everything in her not to grab it. “This isn't something I can do. Can give.”

“Last night you seemed so... open.” She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt he'd liked the kiss and the embrace that came with it. He'd let her freely touch him, and had touched her in return. Her eyes lingered on his gloved hands now, remembering their span across her waist.

_Come back to me._

“Harper. I'm not... suited for – ”

The next door over was flung open and Mando's head jerked up – a Sullustan shuffled out, cradling a rum bottle and grumbling to himself and slamming the door much harder than was necessary. Mando's focus followed until he was out of sight, his instinctive defensive reaction easing.

“Well, I know _I'm_ tired,” Harper deferred.

“Yes. Of course – ”

“First thing tomorrow we'll get out there and – ”

“The parts. Yes.”

“Okay. See you in the morning.”

Harper turned away, then as his door shut and she was left staring at her own door's entry panel she had to spin back around, feeling stupid. She hadn't so much as knocked before the door opened wide again, leaving her fist hovering. Mando seemed to all but fill the door frame.

“I... I need the keycode for my room.”

He was motionless for an uncomfortable length. “One-one-two.”

The room was no-frills, the bed narrow but the floor scrubbed clean. Harper tossed her satchel on the floor and lay down, staring at a ceiling crack. She rubbed the heels of her hands into her eyes in a fervent attempt to smother tears of embarrassment and hurt, just in case the walls were thin and Mando could hear.

* * *

The next morning was an exercise in patience and persuasion as Harper pinballed between three individual parts shops while Mando left to arrange ground transportation. Though he wasn't especially stingy with money, Harper never cared for being ripped off, especially not by those eager to take advantage of outsiders without a lot of options.

As agreed, they met again outside the tavern two hours later.

“We have a cargo transport,” Mando said at the same time Harper announced, “I've got a warehouse manager on his last legs. He just needs a little push...?”

Her voice pitched up cajolingly at the end. Mando just stood there, in his helmet and gleaming armor and bristling with weaponry, every inch the kind of back-up she needed... and when he realized what she was asking for he sighed deeply, head tilting back.

“I'm not an enforcer for your haggling,” he said without rancor.

“Oh, of course not,” she agreed amiably. “It's just a bonus.”

Propelled by some flirtatious instinct she found her weight shifting toward him, body canting in an undeniably suggestive way. Once aware of it she neutralized it, feigned shading her eyes from the watery sun, and said, a bit too loudly, “It's just the next street over.”

Mando's silent presence behind her wasn't quite as effective as she'd hoped – the manager was a grizzled old salt, and not easily intimidated – but it did help, and at last both buyer and seller nailed down a final price they were reasonably satisfied with. The manager recognized the name of the man with the cargo transport, and said he'd contact them at the tavern once everything was packed and ready to move out.

“And that's everything,” Harper explained to Mando once they were outside, handing him the empty credits pouch as well as the data chip containing the list of purchase specifics. “The missing components, panels to patch up the hull, and of course replacement tools. I wasn't thrilled about seven hundred a pop for the thrusters, but the Razor Crest's lateral sockets aren't the most common dimensions and he figured that out so I had to take what I – ”

“I trust you.” Mando's calm interruption startled her from her itemization. “You got us the best deal you could.”

 _Do_ you trust me? she wanted to ask, pleading and melancholy. Trust her with his money, his ship... but not with his heart?

Maybe it was simply too much to ask of him. What happened in the cave was an extenuating circumstance. She could understand... at least, she thought she could. He was not, precisely speaking, an ordinary man, who relented to ordinary desires. He was constructed of his dedication to his work and his culture, his Way, more surely than blood and bone. She'd never sought to change that. There had been space for a stolen embrace; but was that all?

Wondering was daunting, she concluded as they returned to the tavern. Circular thoughts, round and round, going everywhere and nowhere. She only wished he could – would – tell her all this himself.

* * *

Normally Harper could appreciate socializing after days of in-space seclusion but now the noise of the tavern irked her, the conversations of others jarring and the spikes of laughter feeling irrationally false. So she was relieved when a warehouse clerk came to tell them their transport was ready to head out.

“I'm going to go ahead with the bike,” Mando said. “You follow with the driver so he knows where to go in case we lose each other in the trees.”

Luckily this did not happen as, in the back of the hover-sledge, tucked between two fuel cells, Harper found her eyes drifting shut. But even though the sledge was slower than the speeder could go they reached the Razor Crest quicker than expected, the abrupt braking jolting her awake just as soon as she'd nodded off.

They unloaded the parts, tipped the driver, wasted no time getting down to business. The lateral thrusters were of the most importance, and once they were secure Mando went to the cockpit and coaxed the ship up and properly oriented it on the landing gear. Next were the hull segments, which were awkward due to the size rather than difficult to install, and the wiring, to restore lighting so they could see what they were doing inside.

One of the lighting control compartments was situated low on the living area wall, and Harper's neck was getting a crick in it so she lay on her side, her headlamp providing illumination within. Nearby, Mando sat at the table with a spread of variously-sized actuators in front of him.

“You know," she informed him, "While I was haggling, the warehouse manager offered to throw in a couple days' use of a mech droid.” It would've helped the work go faster but she'd turned him down, knowing Mando's aversion. “I've never asked why you don't like droids.”

For a few beats the only sound was the ratcheting of his hydrospanner against metal. “Can't read them.”

She supposed that made a sort of sense. In his line of work that was a necessity; anticipating people's actions, predicting what they'd done or were about to do.

“Some would say the same about you,” she returned, light and teasing.

“I'm sure they would.”

Harper wiped her forehead with her sleeve, and when she lowered it Mando was turning on the bench, fixing on her. She continued threading the wiring through the appropriate slots, but lifted her brows to prompt him to speak. He was actually fidgeting with his spanner, she realized. He never fidgeted.

“Harper... ”

There was a scrabbling and Mando's head snapped up in response to something beyond her; she jerked around to see a hooded head peeking in through the hatchway, accompanied by the muzzle of a blaster.

Mando launched himself forward, knocking the wind out of her as he covered her. A blaster bolt streaked overhead as he whipped his own weapon from its holster and fired. The intruder shrieked, and disappeared, and a weighty thud came from the hold below.

“I knew they'd be back,” Mando muttered as he pushed up off Harper, helping her to her feet before brushing past her into the cockpit. “I can see three more outside.”

“I don't think this is the same group." Harper peered cautiously down the ladder. The lifeless body below was swathed head to toe in heavy fur robes, creating the illusion of a dead animal on the floor. The locals who'd attempted to trade had been dressed far more simply.

“All the same to me,” was all Mando said before he was reaching for his rifle and disappearing down the ladder.

“Mando – wait." Harper slid down behind him but as soon as her feet hit the floor he threw his arm out, blocking her from moving.

“Go back up,” he ordered.

“They're just some scavengers, let me help – ”

“A blaster bolt from a scavenger will kill you the same as anyone else's. I can't take care of this if I'm looking out for you.”

“Okay. Yeah, okay. You're right.”

He went to turn away, but then huffed in resignation. “If you want to provide extra fire, do it from inside the ship. Don't come out. And don't fire if I'm anywhere near your range.”

As Mando vanished through the front hatch Harper slunk after him, staying hidden behind the bulkhead. She stared at out at the scrubby forest, pulse so fast she felt it in her very eyeballs. From beyond the front of the ship came blaster fire, and the thump of bodies colliding, and though she trusted Mando's judgement and expertise the mental imagery still wasn't pleasant.

At the unmistakeable metallic scrape of a blaster bolt striking the hull she flinched. “We just fixed that!” she hissed at no one in particular.

Just then a fur-clad figure darted out from behind one of the rear landing stabilizer – Harper squeezed off a shot, then another, the latter of which caught the runner's arm. There was a curse of pain and displeasure, but even this mild deterrent sent the figure stumbling away across the uneven ground. But he hadn't even reached the treeline before a blaster bolt knocked him prone. Harper blinked, confused; the bolt had not come from where she knew Mando was.

She hunkered back in the hatchway, staring out hard, as Yoran materialized from the trees and, glancing disinterestetdly at the fur-robed scavenger – utterly motionless – approached the ship. The sounds of battle had faded but still Harper remained inside, until she saw Mando round the nose of the ship.

“The arrival of the cargo has only attracted further attention,” Yoran stated in unaccented Basic, turning to Mando. “If you wish it, I will stay with you tonight to guard your ship until you can depart.”

Mando rotated his rifle up to rest the pronged barrel against this shoulder. “Your offer is generous,” he replied, matching Yoran's formality. “I accept it, with my thanks.”

Yoran's head swiveled back to Harper, lingering. She'd grown used to this manner of one-way observation, but from Mando only. She'd forgotten how discomfiting it had been at the start. 

“If this is all... done with,” she said, stuffing her hands in her back pockets, “I'm going to get back to work.”

“That is well,” acknowledged Yoran.

As she walked away, she did so under the weight of two pairs of Mandalorian eyes.

* * *

It was dark. Even the sky was flat and black, clouds denying any chance of starlight. Now that their situation proved to be even more precarious, restoring the lighting had taken a backseat to repairs that were essential to get the ship up and flying. What lights were running were minimal, and once the sun took its leave Harper used her headlamp until her eyes were sore from the strain and she had to stop to get her visual focus back.

Outside, Yoran had started a fire. On a spit above it was midsized bird, plucked and headless and sizzling. Mando sat cross-legged on the ground, hands on his knees and posture as straight as any of the trees around them. As Harper settled down beside him she got the impression she was not interrupting a conversation, but rather they had been only sitting in cordial silence.

“I finished with the filters,” she said in an undertone to Mando. His head tilted down in a single nod.

“The eggs of the plow-bill taste better than its flesh,” Yoran explained, retrieving the carcass and putting it on a plate he'd requested earlier from their galley. “But you will find it filling enough.”

“I've never been accused of being choosy,” Harper said with a shrug.

Yoran glanced her way, nodding in approval, and reached up to remove his helmet.

Even in Harper's peripheral vision Mando visibly startled, almost to the point of recoiling, as Yoran set his helmet on the log beside him. His wrinkled face was framed by a tidy white beard, blue eyes faded and lined but still keen. He drew a knife from his boot and proceeded to messily but effectively dissect the bird, putting a leg on a smaller plate and passing it to Harper. He did the same for Mando, but he might as well have been extending him a rock rather than edible food for all Mando acknowledged it.

“Are you not hungry?” Yoran prompted.

From Mando's demeanor, a casual viewer would think Yoran had stripped completely nude. From what Harper knew – which was not much, as she had but one source – it was anathema for Mandalorians to remove their helmets. It was dishonor, a disavowal of what it meant to be Mandalorian. Yet here Yoran was, bare-headed and as calm about it as you please.

When Mando finally deigned to reply, his voice was rigid. “I eat in private.”

Yoran set down the plate, and chewed a wing thoughtfully. He put forth something in Mando'a, clearly a question from how it ticked up at the end.

Mando's chin lifted. “No, I trust her.”

Harper's eyes flicked back and forth between the two Mandalorians, searching the older man's face - and Mando's bearing - for clues. Yoran shook his head ruefully.

“So much is different now,” was all he had to say before retreating into silence.

The meat was tough and smoky from the fire, but Harper's empty stomach had few complaints. As she ate she watched Mando, the gears all but audibly turning in his head. Unsettled; suspicious. The questions, the demand to understand that which was not just unfamiliar to him, but incomprehensible.

As soon as Harper finished her leg Yoran gestured without a word for her to give him her empty plate, and added several hunks of meat. He then added an additional serving to Mando's untouched plate, and swatted away an inquisitive insect.

“I'm going to try to finish a few things before I fall asleep here in the dirt,” Harper said once she'd finished. “Thanks for hunting and cooking, Yoran.”

Yoran raised a hand in farewell. As she left, she glanced back just once over her shoulder. Mando remained as motionless as a monk, the only movement the reflection of flames dancing across his impassive visor.

* * *

Aside from a sole brief glimpse, as she'd happened to pass by while he was coming out, Harper had never seen Mando's room. But the door had been left open in their comings and goings and as she sat now on the galley counter, idly swinging her feet as she coupled micro-conduit chain-wires together before hitting the sack, well, it was hard not to get a view. The room was eight feet by six at most, essentially a closet for the bed, partly inset into the wall bed and framed by shelving and storage compartments from ceiling to floor. She could've gone in, her curiosity itching, but she made herself be content with what she could see in her headlamp's beam.

Boundaries were important. She wanted to respect his. So far, she thought she'd done so. But she had no way of knowing which of those were in place because he wanted it so, and what was because he didn't have the vocabulary, experience, or frame of reference to explain how he felt.

There were footsteps on the ladder, and Mando appeared, little more than a silhouette in what dim light there was. Harper switched off her headlamp so as not to blind him.

“Where's Yoran?”

Mando palmed the control panel to slide closed the door separating the living area from the cockpit. “Keeping watch outside.”

“Did you... have a good talk?”

“I did. He had... much insight.” He didn't seem like he meant to continue, but he wasn't walking away, either. So Harper waited, patient, coupling chain-wires while he sorted his thoughts.

“There are other Mandalorians here.” He leaned back against the wall opposite her, feet shoulder width apart, hands folded in front of him. “Not many, he says; the remnants of his clan, what was left after the Purge.”

Harper would've expected far more shock in his demeanor, but his relative composure all but confirmed her suspicions that he maintained his own Mandalorian associations, however few. “If the living's as rough out here as he said, how do they survive?”

“Hunting, trapping, some trading. Mixed bag. A couple work off-planet as mercs and bounty hunters, but use this the community as their home base.”

“Resourceful.”

His chest filled a little with pride. “Mandalorians are good at that.”

“You came here for a job," she mused, "Got it done in what I'm convinced is record time, and then... things sure did take a turn. I'm glad you came across Yoran.”

He nodded slowly, then straightened, as if to go into his room.

“Hey.” Her voice was soft. “You and I never really got to have _our_ talk. Assuming you're not talked-out for the night.”

He stood motionless; yet no so much impassive, but uncertain. Wavering.

“I'll leave you be,” Harper continued, “If you say so.” Her lips twisted in a half-smile. “I may not like it, but I'll do it. Gods know I should sleep.”

He drew closer. Close enough to brush against her knees. Sitting on the counter as she was, it brought her closer to eye level with him than usual, but still he turned her chin up with one knuckle.

“I know what you'll want from me, Harper. And I can't give it.”

"What is it I want?" she pushed; though softly. "For you to abandon your beliefs, your way of life, to settle down and play house?" 

"No. I know you better than that." He averted not just his gaze but his entire frame, dropping his hand. “I cannot take it off.”

“I wouldn't ask you for that.” It was sacrosanct for him; something he could probably never fully explain even if he tried. And that was alright. She didn't need him to. His own faith in his Way was enough. “It can be like before. In the cave. No lights.”

“And how long would you be satisfied with that?” His tone was skeptical, and sad.

“Should I tell you I want to see you?” she responded. “Yes. I _want_ to. If things were different. But I don't _need_ to. I don't have to know what you look like to know how I feel about you.”

“You sound so sure.”

“Because I am.” She flushed pink from her confessions. She leaned forward and, deliberately, so he could move back if he wanted, spread her hands on his cuirass. There was both peace and exhilaration existing in this single moment; sharing space, the heartbeats between breaths, the rise and fall of his chest. “I felt this way long before the cave, and all without ever seeing anything other than your bare hand.”

“I remember that.”

She shrugged in acknowledgment. “Wasn't that long ago – ”

“No, I mean – I remember my hand in yours. I couldn't recall the last time someone touched me like that.” He was barely audible through the vocodor. “And your tongue, poking out between your teeth as you concentrated. I... thought about it, the rest of the day.”

“You did?”

His helmet inclined forward. “I did.”

Her mouth was hot and dry all of a sudden. “What did you think about?”

“How gentle you were. So ready to help. I thought about...” He made a self-conscious sound in his throat. “After I'd pushed back your hair, I wondered how it would feel without gloves in the way.”

Slowly he tugged them off, tucking them into his belt. Her heart leapt into her throat as he cupped her cheek with one palm – carefully, as if he might shatter her. Hands capable of violence, practiced in brutal efficiency; so tender. Unsteady.

“I thought about a lot of things. How you smile at me. As if you can... see me, even though you can't. I thought about touching you, just... just like this.” His thumb brushed over her cheek. His voice was huskier now, his words spaced further apart. He was getting shy, laying himself bare. “How... it would feel to have your body against mine. Your hands on me.”

“I thought about you, too,” she murmured to relieve him of all the work, letting her body cant forward against his. Light as birds his hands came down to land on her waist, right at the gap where her shirt rucked up and her skin was exposed. She inhaled, fast and shaky. “All the time.”

“All the time?” He sounded both uncertain and fascinated.

“Mm-hm. There were a hundred other things for me to think about in my bunk at night other than your face.”

“In your bunk – ” He cut himself off, as if he still needed to process before he could finish that sentence.

She drew him closer, into the V of her thighs. Her fingertip traced the channels on his cuirass, down to the hexagonal diamond in the middle, centered like a heart. “Do you want me to come into your room with you?”

“Yes.”

She slid off the counter; he drew her back through his open door. There was no real need to shut it but Harper fumbled for the control panel anyway. It felt safer that way; private, lit only dimly by a wall lamp in the corner.

She slid her fingertips over the ridges of his knuckles, lacing her own fingers through his. He let out a ragged breath and she swayed into him, pressing her forehead to the cheek of the helmet. The need to be close to him was unbearable, the layers between them an unjust torment, and she released him to grab her shirt hem –

“Stop.” He put one hand over hers. “I... I want to.”

It didn't matter if he'd done this before or not, his touch as he undressed her was torture; not just the contact but his speed, or lack thereof. He approached the task as if he'd never seen such garments in his life and was unsure how to remove them; as if he were unwrapping a delicate and expensive gift. She stood still except when she needed to lift her arms, or step out of her trousers as he unbuttoned them and they slipped to the floor.

When at last she stood naked before him he also just stood, hands returning to his sides. She let him look. Her nipples pebbled, her body heating at the mere knowledge of his invisible gaze on her. But before he had the chance to remove his armor or turn off the light or do anything else she reached for him, putting her arms around his neck and sinking against him. The myriad of textures against her bare skin was titillating, the hard planes of his armor erotic against her soft breasts and bare body, and her initiative was rewarded by a sharp inhale through his helmet's vocoder. His hands returned to her hips, even more tentative than before, and that was saying something. She ran her own down his cuirass and at this silent encouragement his hold on her grew firm, sliding up to the inward curve of her waist.

When she found the jutting bulge in his fly he tensed, sucking in a breath. She pulled back and searched his helmeted face; illogical, but instinctive. She could hardly forget what he'd said in the cave, about no one having seen him. But there was still a lot you could do with a helmet on. “Has anyone else ever...?”

“No. Well, there was another guild member. Years ago. Not Mandalorian. We worked together on a bounty once... and when the job was done, she wasn’t shy about letting me know she was interested. It... didn't feel like an option for me. So nothing happened.”

Gently she palmed his cock through his trousers, listening to his breathing pattern through the helmet. Hearing him was a torment, sending fresh heat to the apex of her thighs - 

His fingers closed around her wrist. “No. No more, I... the light. Turn it off.”

She obliged. For the second time she had the pleasure of listening to him undress. It took a long time; groping around, she located the bed and sat on the edge. This was where he slept, where he was at his most unguarded. Where she'd envisioned him so many times after they retired to their separate sleeping spaces at night.

Mando found her once more in the dark. In the cave he'd still been mostly clothed but now, as she explored with greedy fingertips, a lump formed in her throat. Solid chest, sinfully broad shoulders. Not a brawny musculature, but utilitarian, lean and strong and warm. She let out an uneven sigh as she traveled down his flat stomach, following the light trail of hair, curving her hands along the inward cut of muscle that vee'd down his abdomen.

A shudder ran through him as she pressed her lips to his pectorals, then rose up on her knees to kiss him properly. As before, in the cave, he did not respond immediately; but respond he did, and quicker now, his head dipping as the kiss deepened. Gods, she was beyond coherent thought; dizzied by the artless but unequivocally passionate sweep of his hands over her, by his sturdy frame flush against hers, the hard flex of his biceps as she gripped them. She moaned into his mouth, pulling him down atop her on the bed; needing, _needing._

She parted her thighs so his hips could settle between them, his weight an exquisite pressure. He braced on one forearm, the fingers of his other hand slotting against her ribs while his lips found her temple, her hair. He didn't seem inclined to _do_ anything just yet, only to breathe her in. To _be._ When his mouth brushed inadvertently over her neck she flat out whimpered; the fluid stretch of his body stiffened, as if startled.

“Do that again,” she whispered.

He paused, bent his head; paused again, then kissed her neck.

“Fuck,” she groaned. Her knee came up over his waist, undulating closer; against not padding, or armor, but the real and natural contours of him. It was intoxicating, fanning the embers of long-hidden feelings into searing flames.

“I... thought of this, too,” he admitted, so hushed just beside her ear. “Your neck.”

“My neck?” she repeated breathlessly.

“Your hair is always up while you work.”

He kissed her shoulder, her collarbone, his stubble a not-unpleasant rasp against her pulse – at first a mere gossamer press of his lips, experimental, then with rising momentum as she writhed against him. When he reached the top of her breast he slowed.

“Can I – ”

“ _Yes,_ ” she gasped.

His breath was the lightest puff of air against her, and as the flat of his tongue tentatively pressed her nipple she bowed up unto him, sinking her hands into his hair. One arm snaked around her waist, too tight now; he'd swung from trepidation to that kind of hard, primal desire he didn't know what to do with. It made her breathing a little short. She didn't tell him to stop.

She wanted him inside her, her inner walls already fluttering in craven anticipation. She dragged her hands along the muscles of his back, sliding one in between them, and when she ran light fingers over the hard, silky length of his cock his body went taut as a bowstring.

“I want you so badly I can't stand it,” she groaned; half laughing, half as serious as the grave. He made her into a simpleton, and a wanton simpleton at that; he was headier than the purest spice.

“Uh-huh.” It came out an overwrought growl, gruff and deep. Then he kissed her again, both hands framing her face as she shifted beneath him, drawing his cock towards her entrance. But his body was going tense again, and he broke off the kiss, turning away so his hair brushed her cheek.

“Too fast?” she breathed. His heart hammered against her questioning palm. It would be sensory overload, wouldn't it: skin on skin, such concentrated closeness. A king's feast, spread before a man who'd forgotten what it was like to be truly full.

“No – yes – ” And then he muttered something that in tone resembled an expletive, but one she was unfamiliar with; and she was familiar with most. She'd never heard him use his own language before.

Softly she kissed his cheek, his jaw, pushing at his chest. “Here, sit up. Against the wall.”

As he did so she followed him in the dark, straddling his lap and folding her limbs around him. She rested her cheek against his head, smoothing the tousle of his hair. A long breath escaped him, and he wrapped his arms around her with an intensity that felt very much as if he was trying to absorb her. One inquiring, introspective thumb began to trace patterns on her back, spiraling around the individual vertebrae of her spine.

His mouth found her neck again, and she sighed; and then, almost inaudibly, he said, “Dyn.”

She let her head loll to the side. “Does that mean something Mando'a?”

“It's not Mando'a.” His words tickled her throat. “It's my name.”

Her languor stilled. “What?”

“I... can't give you my face, but I can give you this. It's Dyn.”

Unspeakable emotion swelled in her at this intimacy, at the priceless pearl of trust he was offering her. She pulled back, so she could touch his features – feel the flush in his cheeks, pass her fingertips over his shapely lips.

“Dyn,” she breathed, and at the single syllable he made an strangled sound. His hands tightened on her, hips stuttering against hers, and she bit back a moan as his cock slid over her slick folds.

“Oh – _oh,_ ” she panted as she began to sink down on him, eyes shutting tight at the delicious stretch and burn. His impatient hips snapped up, filling her completely in one swift movement; she raked at his shoulders, light-headed. She stayed just like that, paralyzed by sublime sensation, and when their foreheads met he kissed her with enough want that it took her breath away.

She began to move against him, long sinuous rolls that glided along his cock and dragged on her clit. Jolts of electric pleasure fired through her core. Mando – no, Dyn – his _name,_ dream-like and unreal – gripped her waist; but not taking control of the rhythm, just moving along with hers.

“You like this?” she murmured, wanting to be sure. This was his first time, after all; and not just a regular first time, but one that was coming after several decades of emotional solitude and near-monastic dedication. “Do you want – ”

His reply was a near-feral rasp. “I want it just how you're doing it.”

She continued; his hands on her were so big, so tight. Her palm hit the wall for support, a ragged gasp torn from her – her climax was blinding, thighs tightening around him, and as she was tumbled by the waves of it she buried her face in his hair once more and shuddered against him.

Where she now slowed, he took over, driven by unpracticed but acute instinct. It was erotic in and of itself, him chasing his own pleasure unchecked, breathing harsh and rough and synced to his steady thrusts. He groaned her name, at once fierce and reverential on his lips.

“Don't stop,” she entreated, hooking one arm around his neck and matching her movements to his.

“I'm about to – should I not...”

He may be a virgin but he wasn't an idiot, and she understood his line of thinking. “I want you to come in me, Dyn, please – ”

The choked sound he made was that of a man lost and he brought her down hard on his pulsing cock, panting out his release, underscored by a faint thud that must be his head falling back against the wall.

Harper sagged forward onto him. Her arm, still draped over his shoulder, slid away uselessly when he shifted down to lie back on the bed, bringing her with him. Against her cheek his chest rose and fell rapidly, heartbeat racing, strong and pure.

* * *

She slept in her own bunk that night. He'd said she didn't have to, there was no window in his room anyway to illuminate him when the sun rose, but she remembered the awkward shuffle that morning in the cave: how she'd pretended to be asleep, listening to him put his armor on and trying to determine when she could open her eyes; how he'd said eventually had to say, “I know you're awake. I'm dressed now.”

When she'd pulled her tunic on late last night to leave his room he'd said, stiltedly, “Maybe I want you to stay.”

She walked her fingers up his arm, toying with a lock of hair, tracing the outline of his mouth. It was a tempting prospect, to fall asleep curled against him, enveloped in velvet darkness. But she wanted that privacy for him; he deserved the freedom.

“I'll be just across the corridor,” she'd promised. He hadn't argued any further.

Now, as she awoke, before even surfacing to full consciousness she was suffused with a glow as pink and warm as the sunrise: Dyn. _Dyn_.

She tugged on her clothes. From the angle of light through the cockpit, it was late morning; she hadn't meant to oversleep. He wasn't upstairs, and the hold was empty aside from some of the crates and loose equipment on the floor. Going outside she saw Yoran was missing, too, but so was the speeder bike. It seemed more plausible that they'd gone off together, Mandos doing Mando things, rather than that harm had befallen them, so Harper gathered her tools and set about replacing the fuel lines under the sightless carbonite gaze of the captured contracts.

It was nearing midday when a shadow fell onto the floor next to her, from the hatch she'd left open due to fumes. She sat back on her heels, turning.

Dyn watched her from the top of the ramp with his head to one side, cape snapping a little in the brisk wind. He'd intimidated her, once upon a time; and sure, sometimes he still did. But the parts and pieces of him, inorganic as they were, had grown as familiar to her as a face; the forbidding figure had conditioned in her a reflexive response that, she felt sure, was not at all what his bounties experienced.

She smiled up at him. “Hi.”

“I was gone longer than expected,” he began.

“I had plenty to do. We've made a lot of progress. I want to stay focused on the necessities, and save some of the miscellaneous fixes for once we're somewhere secure.” From behind him came the rev and whine of the speeder, and she leaned sideways to see bike and rider shoot out of view. “Is Yoran taking off?”

“Yes. He – ” He shifted his weight to one foot. “He took me to his community.”

She wiped her hands on the rag tucked in her toolbelt. “Really? How was that?”

He took in and then let out a deep, pensive breath. “Different.”

“Good different, or bad different?”

“I'm not sure,” he admitted thoughtfully. “Just different. I'll... tell you more, sometime.”

Harper tipped her head back, as far as she could, as Dyn came to stand directly above her and, after a pause, extended his hand. She took it, and let him draw her to her feet. He considered her, then brushed back her mussed hair with both hands, sliding over to the back of her head.

His right glove had wrinkled up, revealing a slash of golden skin at his wrist. On impulse she turned her head within the cradle of his hands and pressed her mouth to it. An untrained eye might see no overt response but he started, a frisson running down his forearm.

“You suit me just fine,” she promised against his pulse.

His fingers curled back a little, a ghost of the motion of drawing her to him. To spare him the hesitation she melted in against him, and as if in confirmation that's what he'd wanted he tipped his chin up so she could fit beneath. Against her cheek was the diamond on his cuirass, and when she ran her thumb along its familiar lines, he flattened her hand on it with his own.

“Do you know what that's called?” The vulnerability in his voice was devastating. “ _Kar'ta beskar._ ”

Her lips shaped the words without sound, before asking, “What does it mean?”

“Iron Heart.”

She'd seen it on Yoran's armor, too. It sounded noble, and proud. A warrior's sigil. She knew beskar's significance; but only Dyn's helmet was made of it. The cuirass which actually held the symbol was durasteel... it wasn't about the armor.

“Iron Heart,” she repeated.

“Beskar is all but impenetrable,” he reflected, though she knew this also. “My own heart... it seems... not so much.”

Oh, this man of hers. How he could _feel,_ under it all. What he was expressing to her, the best way he knew how.

“Of course I want you protected at all times,” she said, clearing her throat to mask her emotion, “But for this, I think, a weakness is alright.”

His voice subtly, but unmistakably, cracked. “It is.”

She could say more. She had words and names for her feelings that Dyn did not. But they could be tucked away for another time. Here, now, they were unneeded.

“Well,” she said, squeezing his hand before stepping away. She took in in the scattered tools around her workspace. “There's still a lot to do, but we're close. We might even be able to leave tonight if we really keep at it.”

There was a sort of centeredness to his bearing now, and he looked at her for so long she was on the verge of asking what was the matter. But she just looked back. Eventually he tipped his chin at the spanner tucked in her belt pouch, and she shrugged and relinquished it to him, and when their hands brushed, they held.

The set of his shoulders was easy, his exhale contented. “Let's get out of here.”

* * *


	3. Chapter 3

* * *

Dyn visited Clan Rill every so often after that. At least alternating months. Harper would find some task or leisure activity to occupy herself on-planet (she discovered very relaxing public hot springs in the town north of Ostagat) while he disappeared for a day or two. It was important, she knew, that he spend time with his own people. With an older Mandalorian like Yoran. With age came wisdom of course but in this circumstance, also a rich trove of experiences and stories, uniquely Mandalorian, much of which had been lost in recent years.

Dyn was usually introspective when he returned, but in a way that was simply quiet rather than downcast or ill-tempered. While he was granted access to the community as a matter of course, they were understandably cautious regarding non-Mandalorians, and though Harper had no real urge to visit (after all, they were just people,) she liked to hear Dyn describe them in bed in the dark. He kept much to himself, but she learned that what he did share was not the trivialities, but that which lingered longest on his mind. That in the days of the Empire the political state of Mandalore, both the planet itself and the culture as a whole, was complicated beyond reason. How the half dozen Rill children played freely, unhelmeted; most of the adults also. A couple had gotten married, a concept that apparently was nonexistent among the tribe that took him in as an orphan.

He gave voice to these these things haphazardly, as if thinking aloud, working through them as one would tidy a tangled skein of yarn. As if in tandem with his winding thoughts his fingertips sketched patterns on her skin as she lay tucked against him. Sometimes she'd ask him further questions, and he might continue; other times he would make a comment then lapse back into a ruminative silence she didn't wish to poke at.

Bounty work was as lucrative as ever. True, there was an increasing trend of clients cheaping out of paying guild fees and instead turning to hunters outside the guild, even if bargain prices meant sloppier work... but, given Dyn's reputation and his status as one of the guild's most accomplished members, he had yet to come home without a pocketful of fresh pucks.

Home. Now there was a loaded word. And yet, in Harper's mind it seemed very straightforward. “Home is where you don't have to sleep with one eye open,” someone once told her. She'd been too young then to fully understand it. She did now. The Razor Crest had become her home; hers and Dyn's, not coexisting in it, but together. It needed no overthinking. It simply was.

As fond as she'd grown of the Crest, the affection was more for what it represented than its physical attributes. It was in decent shape thanks in large part to their meticulous maintenance but, as older ships were wont to do, never went long without some problem or another popping up. She had no need for luxury but admittedly kept a mental list of dream upgrades, so to speak; but many of those relied on adequate space (there was precious little of that) and were prioritized in favor of ensuring the ship remained up and running.

However, while Dyn was away with Yoran – going on the third day this time, longer than normal, but she wouldn't worry until the fourth day at least – she'd made plans to reupholster the seats in the cockpit. A triviality, but the leather was cracked and worn, and they spent enough time there... why shouldn't they be comfortable?

At her favorite warehouse in Ostagat she bought a staple gun, and the owner directed her to the textiles market where she located several lengths of sturdy leather in a similar color. When she returned she proceeded to unroll them across the cargo hold floor, wiping away raindrops and idly asking the dormant Rodian in the nearest carbonite frame, "Would you call this maroon, or brown?" Regardless, before she began cutting willy-nilly she'd take the seats' measurements.

Maybe she should've mentioned the idea to Dyn first, she waffled as she went up the ladder. Aside from particularly pricey or convoluted repairs, she hadn't asked him for permission to fix anything since the very beginning. She just did what needed doing, and he'd never shown anything other than approval. But he was particular about the cockpit. This wouldn't affect functionality though, it was purely cosmetic –

There was a man in the pilot's seat.

Harper's tape measure clattered to the floor as she startled backward, veins shot full of adrenaline. Her hand snapped to her blaster hilt, a habit Dyn encouraged her to form and that had eventually taken root.

He was flicking through the handful of holo messages that came during Dyn's absence, as if he had every right to do so. Above the seat back she could only see a taupe shirt collar and head of mussed deep brown hair; curling at the nape of his neck, she saw, as he leaned forward in the seat.

The oddest sensation crept through her.

“Turn around,” she demanded.

The man might or might not have heard her entrance through the pattering rain; but she knew without a doubt he heard her now. He straightened, in a manner that jarred something in the back of her consciousness behind her alarm, and stood.

Liquid dark eyes, naturally hooded in shape and downturned at the corners; olive skin, hawk nose, strong square jaw with a light scruff of facial hair. Her brain catalogued all these features at lightning speed. Her stomach was turning the most incredible knots. His expression was not that of an intruder: it was sober and reserved but, filtering through the cracks, there shone a sort of raw, guarded vulnerability.

“I'd prefer you didn't fall down that ladder again,” he said seriously.

Harper gasped, her shaking hand flying up to shield her eyes. Between her fingers she stared in shock and bewilderment at the floor, at the innocuous tape measure between her feet.

Hands she knew covered hers, folding the fingers in.

From beneath her lashes she looked up at Dyn.

It was the face of a stranger: a face she knew and yet didn’t, features she’d kissed and touched more times than she could count. Immediately her memory began drawing forth that intimate kinetic knowledge to pair it with the new visual input: she knew how those sensual lips felt on hers, had caressed that jawline with her thumb.

Utterly overwhelmed, with tears pricking her eyes and a bubble of hysterical laughter clogging her throat she stammered, “You looked like that all this time?!”

Now it was his turn to stare, not processing. For a moment he seemed to think she was angry. But then he recognized the compliment in her outburst, and he smiled, and it transformed him. He had a dimple; an actual _dimple,_ this enigmatic man of her heart gazing down at her with a small, self-conscious, but sunny grin. Who needed weapons when he could wield a smile like that?

She started to cry.

The smile dropped. “Oh,” Dyn said, at a loss.

I’m sorry,” she lamented, hiding her face in her hands again. “I’m ruining this, I should be the one making it easier for you – ”

“I've given this a lot of thought. I've had time to prepare.”

That made one of them.

“Harper,” he continued cajolingly. “ _Cyar'ika._ ”

At the Mando'a term of endearment she peeped up, allowing her trembling hands to be drawn against his chest – unarmored, in only his flak vest and undershirt. He was everything she'd imagined, and yet nothing like it. There was an old scar bisecting one brow that she hadn't known about; his hair was wavy, something she'd never been quite sure was natural or a result of the helmet. Her fingertips weren't sensitive enough to have picked up the weathering around his eyes – such soft eyes, almost soulful, bright and focused but not at all fierce. It was an interesting face, and she liked it the longer she looked at him.

“But you... what does this mean?” she began once her voice could be relied upon. “You said that once you took it off... that's it.”

“I did say that.” A furrow appeared between his brows. “It was how I'd been taught. But it wasn't always like this. When we first met Yoran, and he said that things were different now, I wasn't sure what he meant. But I know now.”

Dyn's face was remarkably expressive; she supposed he never had to take care to conceal his thoughts and reactions.

“I'll forever owe a debt to those who saved and raised me,” he continued slowly, “But I only knew one way, and thought it was the main road, when really it was a side-path.”

“I'd ask you if you're sure,” Harper ventured, “But it's a little too late to go back now.”

He didn't quite smile, yet his eyes crinkled at the corners. “I won't be walking around like this. This is only in private.”

“I'm... honored you trust me.”

He tilted his head. “Surprised?”

“Not _surprised,_ it's just... from the beginning I made myself accept this would never happen.”

“I know." His tone was level, but weighty. As if he had to take care to get the words out. "One of many reasons why I trust you.”

Harper reached for his cheek – tentatively, as if it were the first time she'd done so in that dusky, frigid cave. The intimacy of touch and eye contact together was breathtaking even for her, and Dyn blinked rapidly, as if adjusting to such heightened stimuli.

“Does it feel strange?” she asked. “To have it off?”

“Yes.” He dropped his gaze, as if the prolonged eye contact was too intense; but after a long breath he turned his head further so her palm fit fully to his jaw. “But like I said, I spent time thinking about this. And... even though you and I are always in the dark, I'm still uncovered. Which makes this a smaller step than if we hadn't been... doing that.”

“ _Doing that,_ ” she echoed slyly.

Without leaving the safety of her cradling hand Dyn's eyes met hers again, his lips compressed, and he honest to gods blushed.

Partly to give him a respite from the sensation of being so closely observed, and partly just because she wanted to, she rose up on her toes, arms around his shoulders, and pressed her face into the bronzed column of his neck. His skin smelled warm and clean, with that faint singey scent of blaster fire clinging to his clothes.

“I love you.” It was not the first time she'd said it, but it was still new enough to make him react, his own arms tightening around her waist. His hair tickled her temple, chest filling as he sighed deeply.

“Before we get out of here,” he murmured into her hair, “Do you want to... go in the back?”

For such a worldly and streetwise man, Dyn's continuing delicacy surrounding sex – not in the having of it, but the frank discussion thereof – was incongruous but endearing.

“No.”

His embrace loosened, hands alighting on the curve of her waist. “No?”

She pulled back, eyes drifting to the pilot's chair behind him and then back to his face. His _face,_ not just warm in expression but inherently so, in its very planes and structure: warm like summer, at odds with the hard winter of his armored exterior, yet utterly and completely right for the man beneath it.

“No,” Harper repeated. “I want to watch you fly.”

His forehead creased in bemusement at the banality of her request. “If you want.”

How often in the early days had she sat behind Dyn – Mando, as she'd known him then – silently yearning, riveted to his deft, capable motions and the rippling blue hyperspace reflections in his helmet? She was in the cockpit enough now that it had lost the novelty, and flew the ship herself on occasion, though she was better at tinkering than piloting. But she wanted to see his bare hands take the controls, watch that inky gaze flicking over the console and focusing out ahead. To drink in that striking profile as he slipped the planet's gravity and took them away, up and out of the atmosphere to wherever they wished to go.

She stood beside him now as he initiated take-off, holding to the seat to keep her balance but itching to touch him, to toy with his hair, transfixed by how the thick waves fell around his ears. As the Crest broke through the dense blanket of clouds into clear blue sky, which in turn faded swiftly to rich indigo and finally to star-studded black, her fingers meandered down his chest.

“Satisfied?” Dyn asked, unconvincingly gruff.

Harper pressed her lips to his cheek and when he turned his head in response she caught his mouth. He made an abbreviated sound in his throat and she pulled back, just enough to meet his eyes. They were heavy-lidded but unblinking. So dark they reflected everything.

“Sure,” she teased, wrapping both arms around his shoulders. “You flew good.”

With the hand that wasn't on the throttle he reached up, covering hers where they rested over his heart. If he were another man, he might declare something profoundly romantic; but he wasn't, he was himself, and all he said now was, “Stay with me awhile?”

There were tasks that needed doing, things she'd been in the middle of and things he'd specifically wanted done; but his desire for her company overrode his practicality, or any lingering tension he might feel at so fully revealing himself. His trust and solace in her presence was enough.

Of course, she stayed.

* * *

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [En terre étrangère](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22652209) by [AyrenFramdreorig](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AyrenFramdreorig/pseuds/AyrenFramdreorig)




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